Cosmopolitan Magazine

Robin Thicke’s music video to his song “Blurred Lines” avidly contributes to the patriarchy, while portraying sexism, gender standards, and beauty standards. His music video can be analyzed from a feminist theory approach, as it’s evident that his song and video contribute to a patriarchal society and its inherently sexist and sexualized ideologies. The ideology behind the song and music video is purely sexual and about male dominance. The lyrics to the song and actions in the video exhibit extreme over sexualization and objectification of the women. Analyzing this piece of popular culture through a feminist approach opens up a provoking conversation about how popular culture functions in a patriarchal culture. Analyzing pop culture though a feminist theory can allow for a larger variety and more in-depth analysis about the social aspects and political agenda within popular culture.

After concluding my remaining readings of chapters 7 through 10 from Cultural Theory and Popular Culture, I found my core understanding of the overall theoretical ideas posed by author, John Storey, had become clearer in the rounding up of the semester. Within chapter 7 of the book, popular culture is discussed in relation to issues connected to feminism, gender and sexuality. According to Storey, “Popular culture has been the object a great deal of feminist analysis” (pg. 136), and, as previously discussed in chapter 5, feminist psychoanalyst, Laura Mulvey shared her theory on the ‘male gaze’, which has been acknowledged and studied by many critics and other feminists. Presented in cinema, music, magazines, and other media outlets, it has been well documented how “popular culture plays a role in patriarchal society and that theoretical analysis of this role warrants a major position in ongoing discussions” (Storey, pg. 136), and, in many cases, “the male viewer’s regard for the publicized female body is often objectified and sexualized” (Inquiry 2). With my knowledge and understanding of hip-hop, the misogyny and sexism that culture glorifies is very noticeable. Misogyny has become a sign of authenticity for many rappers who exploit and sexually objectify women in their rap lyrics and videos to assert and prove their own masculinity. Derogatory words such as ‘bitches’ and ‘hoes’ in rap have become common references for women. I was mindful of how one of my favourite songs,

Cosmopolitan magazine, as it is today, is an international woman’s magazine involving topics on sex, relationships, beauty, fashion and health. The variation of Cosmopolitan (Cosmo) we have in today’s society is rather sexually explicit in many of its articles and covers. This was not always the case. Cosmopolitan was founded by Schlicht & Field in 1886. The magazine was originally created to be a “family magazine” . Cosmopolitan introduced articles on family and home life. In 1888, Cosmo gained a new editor in E. D. Walker. He would add new elements to the magazine. These included serial fiction, book reviews and color illustrations.

True or False: Violent videogames cause children to become more aggressive. Sorry, that was a trick question. Despite much bandying of statistics and loud talking by critics on both sides of the argument, the real answer is that there is no real answer—at least not one that’s been proved scientifically (Zipp). Video games are an appealing target for a public figure in search of a crusade. Movies and music have energetic advocates, but it’s hard to find anyone who will defend games for their artistic value, or even on the grounds of freedom of expression. Usually the strongest argument made for games is that they are harmless fun (Koffler).

In order to arrive at the conclusion from the present study as intended to find out the difference in depiction of women in men’s magazines from that of the women’s magazines, a method of content analysis has been adopted. This content analysis focused on the portrayals of women’s body in advertisement in six different magazines; three Men’s Magazine (Playboy, Maxim and FHM) and three Women’s Magazine (Glamour, In Style and Cosmopolitan). The purpose of this study was to determine the portrayal of women body in the advertisements of the male magazines differ from those of the females. It was also intended toward finding that the women were portrayed in different ways for different audiences. Portrayals of women in magazines (men’s and women’s) may cultivate beliefs or expectations about physical appearance, sexuality, relationships or gender roles. Previous research by Rechert and Carpenter (2004) on this topic suggested that there has been an overall increase in sexual dress in portrayals of women and intimate contact between men and women from 1983 to 2003 in ads of different types of magazines including those for men and women. If the model in the ad was nude or almost nude, she would be considered sexually dressed. Intimate contact was contact between a male and female in an ad that was suggestive of sex or sexual acts. For the sake of the current content analysis, the focus will be on the findings of the increases in sexual dress. According to the researchers, sex in

For twelve weeks Blurred Lines was at the top of the Billboard 100 charts and could be heard thumping from speakers everywhere. Sung by Robin Thicke and featuring prominent rappers T.I. Harris and Pharrell, this track was proclaimed the anthem for summer 2013 . At the surface the song is seemingly harmless with a cheery rhythmic beat and catchy lyrics, but when examining the song and accompanying music video, Blurred Lines is anything but harmless. Dubbed “that rape song” by many discerning listeners, Blurred Lines is a song about the blurred lines of consent. With gems such as “You’re an animal, just let me liberate you” and “I’ll give you somethin’ big enough to tear yo ass in two” featured throughout the song it is astonishing how

Thinness is an aesthetic trait that has been highly valued in American media. The next section of analysis focuses on how body size is displayed and interpreted in Glamour.

One of these commentators, Dorian Lynskey, weighed in on the conversation in her article “Blurred Lines: the most controversial song of the decade”, where she discussed the song’s effect on mass media. Within the piece, Lynskey brought to attention the recent banning of the song by several student unions in the United Kingdom, as well as a video created by a feminist organization known as Project Umbrella, equating the lyrics of Blurred Lines to words spoken by perpetrators of sexual assault to their victims. Following with citations from several esteemed women in their respective fields such as singer-songwriter Lily Allen and music video director Diana Martel, Lynskey portrayed the controversy of the piece by juxtaposing numerous opinions to one another from these self-proclaimed

For example, some girls rely on those magazine for information on beauty and fashion, their standards of beauty are followed by those cover models. Also, there is one scholar stated that marketing strategies attempted to lure readers into purchasing one idea that they would look better, their sense of self appearance had been changed. (Sarkar 2014) To support this idea, one research pointed out that audiences are affected by those magazine models, and some teenage girls try to emulate them (Sanders 2009).

Throughout the last decade, the music industry has been influenced by many songs that have shifted the popular culture, and the public’s norms. Some of these shifts were considered liberating and an improved attitude toward female sexuality and some were criticized as promotional to an offensive rape culture. “Blurred Lines” is one of the latter for several reasons and throughout this essay, I’m going to explain these reasons through my standpoint on “Blurred Lines” as a Taoist. To begin with, as a taoist I wouldn’t promote conflictive male - female relationships at any point, I’d rather promote harmonious male - female relationships through understanding the other partner, identifying her as equal and sharing my needs and desires with her.

Nicole Calle   October 29, 2015   George Miller   Journalism and Society      Media Comparison   Glamour and Cosmopolitan      Glamour and Cosmopolitan magazine are both concentrated on lifestyle and beauty concepts for women. However, each of them display similar but different content in their articles and attract a very different type of reader. Their difference is also marked in the way their content is visually displayed and in the overall style of each magazine. Advertisement also plays a contrasting role between Glamour and Cosmo. Upon first glance, the visual of these two magazines is the first differentiating factor between them.

Music videos have the power to influence people and provide a way for the artist to express themselves. The society we view in today’s world is seen as a world beginning to finally open up to homosexuality. An example of the world we live in today can be found in a recent music video created by David Guetta called “Hey Mama”. The music video features Nicki Minaj who is used to introduce femininity in David Guetta’s work. The society David Guetta presents in the music video is more savage like, sexual, and parallel with today’s gender roles. In David Guetta’s music video “Hey Mama” sexuality and gender roles are portrayed in a world that is more fluid than binary.

Blurred Lines is a popular summer song that is constantly played on the radio. A song like “Blurred Lines” should not be played on public radio. A big problem with “Blurred Lines” is that it attempts to normalize disrespectful behavior towards women. Robin Thicke teamed up with rapper T.I. and singer-producer Pharrell to deliver arguably this summer’s most popular song. The song “Blurred Lines” has placed number one on the billboard hot 100 and has sold over one million copies. Critical reception of the track is mostly positive. Yet with the success comes a not so positive response. When first listening to the song a person might find themselves nodding your head to a catchy tune, but perhaps once a person listens closely to the lyrics some people may not want this song on their iPods.

Cosmopolitan magazine is a common household name in today’s day and age. The magazine boasts catchy headlines, celebrities featured on their covers, and covering a multitude of subjects relating to the lifestyle of modern women. However, because of this reputation, many of the editorial’s readers “don’t realize that the magazine has undergone many incarnations before its current one, including family literary magazine and muckraking investigative journal” (Landers).

The international fashion magazine Cosmopolitan which, started as a family magazine, afterward, changed into a women's magazine. The former editor in chief of Cosmopolitan is Michele Promaulayko is also the editor in chief of Yahoo Health. The magazine covers different issues related to women like relationship, health, fashion, and beauty. The purpose of the magazine is to discuss the issues of women furthermore educate them about health and fashion. The author places an importance on subjects such as lifestyle, relationships, and beauty in order to make women consider these subjects. Just like any other magazine, Cosmopolitan has numerous amounts of advertisements in its magazines. The magazine sends a negative message by suggesting women have to look a certain way and it also portrays women in a sexual way and expects women to have an appearance like that of celebrities. Throughout the article, the advertisements suggest that their products will make the women reach the beauty standard. In order for women to buy the products, the advertisers set the beauty standard high.